Warner Bros Discovery (WBD) has been laying out the Polish local production strategy for its Max streaming service, with 15 originals already in development ahead of its launch in the territory next week.

Max will launch in Poland on June 11 as part of its Europe-wide roll out through 2024 and WBD execs were on-hand to deliver two keynote interviews on the company’s strategy in CEE at Content Warsaw this morning.

The streamer will feature hit US films such as Barbie and Wonka alongside HBO originals including The Last of Us, The White Lotus, Euphoria, Succession, The Sympathizer, The Jinx Part Two and upcoming new comedy The Franchise. Max’s ability to draw content from WBD-owned properties such as Eurosport will also see it house exclusive coverage of the Paris Olympics later this year.

But it’s been the various global players’ strategies around local content that have most intrigued audiences at C21’s inaugural event in the Polish capital this week.

Katarzyna Drogowska, head of AVoD streaming and Player editorial director at WBD in Poland, said: “Our aim is to blend the best global, high-quality content with the best of our local content that is being appreciated by the user, and of course a large library of back-catalogue TV.

“We already have in production 15 Max originals that will be available within the next few years. Creating and developing our original local productions is really important to us. Max brings new opportunities for producers, distributors and our partners to cooperate with us because we are planning to our investments to grow,” she told delegates.

“It’s important to give our audience the experience they know and they appreciate. Local content is about what you know; you identify with what is close to you. And it’s not so easy to give that kind of experience on a global level. So it’s about blending that experience and remembering our main goal to have something for everyone to watch.”

Scripted is a priority but buyers from WBD have been speaking with producers and distributors in all genres and the company will “follow data and trends to understand where the main interest lies” once Max is up and running. “We are open to all kinds of partnerships and acquisitions in terms of other sorts of content,” Drogowska said.

Despite Max’s launch, WBD will continue to offer its two other streaming services in Poland: general entertainment brand Player and news streamer TVN24. Asked if it was sustainable to maintain three separate subscription businesses in a crowded CEE marketplace, Drogowska described it as an “ecosystem.”

“The market is changing and it’s about having a scale of delivery,” she said. “The viewer is the most important thing and not everyone is willing or able to pay the same amount, and all the time. Some content might be available to target groups with specific interests. We also have a suite of FAST channels for viewers to enjoy our content for free. Some might find it easier to use the service they have always known, which is local and popular, and new services complement that.

“We want to give an opportunity to viewers to experience the content they want in any way that is possible right now. We’re often asked if we are afraid of cannibalising our own offer. Well, we don’t see any cannibalisation. Actually, we see people want more. In 2021, when we started this strategy, our analytics showed people on connected TV’s spent around one and a half hours a day with us. Currently, three years later, they now spend almost two hours every day on Player.”

Max launches not only into a competitive environment in Poland, but one rife with piracy, making it still more difficult to make a go of pay TV and subscription streaming services.

“Piracy in Poland is strong,” admitted Drogowska. “We have a special department in our organisation and speaking to them yesterday they say we’re fighting hundreds of thousands of violations. It’s a lot. We’ve been in this fight for 14 years, trying to cut off money to pirates, but it’s not easy. We do everything we can.

“What might be useful in Poland is implementing the directive that makes it the responsibility not just of the subject who downloads the content but also the operators and the middlemen. In Germany, there is an approach where this activity is tracked and someone is fined automatically €500 [US$544] for a single download through the mobile operators. In terms of what sort of tools might work well, maybe that is something that would be good for Poland.”